Cease and Desist to continue, but under new ownership

Far from desisting, Mission Street bar Cease and Desist will continue operations under new ownership beginning this week.

Mark DeVito, who launched and owns Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem as well as Standard Deviant Brewing Company, started Cease and Desist, at 2331 Mission Street, as the Buffalo Club in 2015. When another bar by the same name based in Los Angeles sent DeVito a letter asking him to stop using the name, DeVito changed the name to fit.

Since then, however, he’s started up a brewery (Standard Deviant, at 280 14th Street) and two of his business partners have had young children come into their lives. With all of this, running Cease and Desist became too much, he said.

“If my business partners didn’t both have newborn babies and I didn’t have a newborn business baby, we would have the time,” DeVito said. “In the bar business, you don’t want to have absentee ownership.”

So he found a buyer in David Zimmerman, who co-owns Cabin on Polk Street and Blackthorn Tavern in the Inner Sunset. Henry Vazquez and senior bartender Evan Pope will be partnering with Zimmerman in managing the venue, which has two full bars, an upstairs dining space, and a rotating pizza menu. Though the bar will carry on Cease and Desist in mostly its same form, the new owners will be expanding its drink menu to include barrel-aged spirits.

“We’ll not only continue to serve your favorite bites and drinks, but also team up with our neighbors such as Cha Cha Cha and Teeth to make this part of Mission Street even more of a destination for nightlife and delicious, affordable food,” said Zimmerman in a statement.